Board game apparatus

ABSTRACT

In a preferred embodiment of the game combination, there is provided a game board and particular sets of pieces therefor, the game board having an upper playing surface which includes printed thereon designated playing squares or circles or the like on which one piece of play at a time may be stationed, with there being indicated different and alternative directions of move to another playing square or circle or the like from that at which the piece is presently located, and the playing circles (for example) being differentiated from one group thereof from another group thereof, with one group substantially surrounding and circumscribing the other group thereof, the surrounded group being representative of a defense fortress and the outer group being represented as the outer area from which attack is waged, the beginning one or more starting spaces or circles (for example) being located at least one in each of the inner (surrounded) group and the outer (surrounding) group of circles. There additionally are moving spaces between respective ones of the circles along the indicated directions of move. There are typically two differently identifiable sets of king, four knights and eight pawns.

A nited States Patent [191 Kelly Mar. 25, 1975 [54] BOARD GAME APPARATUS [76] Inventor: William S. Kelly, 67-81 Alderton St., Rego Park, NY. 11374 22 Filed: Aug. 20, 1973 [21] Appl. No.1 390,111

Primary Examiner-Delbert B. Lowe [57] ABSTRACT In a preferred embodiment of the game combination,

there is provided a game board and particular sets of pieces therefor, the game board having an upper playing surface which includes printed thereon designated playing squares or circles or the like on which one piece of play at a time may be stationed, with there being indicated different and alternative directions of move to another playing square or circle or the like from that at which the piece is presently located. and the playing circles (for example) being differentiated from one group thereof from another group thereof, with one group substantially surrounding and circumscribing the other group thereof, the surrounded group being representative of a defense fortress and the outer group being represented as the outer area from which attack is waged, the beginning one or more starting spaces or circles (for example) being located at least one in each of the inner (surrounded) group and the outer (surrounding) group of circles. There additionally are moving spaces between respective ones of the circles along the indicated directions of move. There are typically two differently identifiable sets of king, four knights and eight pawns.

1 Claim, 5 Drawing Figures BOARD GAME APPARATUS This invention relates to a novel board parlor game for typically two opponent players with opposing pieces.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION There are many games which are of such a simple nature as to be challenging only to children, while others are of such complexity in rules and numbers of different pieces as to be too complex and complicated for a typical child and to be suitable solely for adults, some of these adult games being even too challenging for the average adult or too demanding of concentration as to be desired by adults who merely want a reasonably challenging but simple easy-play enjoyable game such as for example some card games.

In recent years, there has been a new interest by the general adult public in games such as checkers and particularly chess, but because of the historicallyconceived reputation of chessas a highly complicated and demanding game which apparently can be played intelligently or effectively only by one who has studied and memorized many different games and/or game openings, even after mastering the rather complicated differences in possibility of moves and/or capture per move for different pieces, many adult persons as well as young adults have been fearful of tackling chess on a serious basis, even for simple random play with a friend for fear of making fools of themselves, or merely of not knowing what they were doing.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to obtain a game combination of elements which overcomes one or more of the above-noted difficulties and/or disadvantages, together with obtaining new and interesting features of play, while nevertheless to some extent resembling pieces of play of chess, with also some of the features of checkers.

Another object is to obtain a game easily learned and with sufficient interplay and purpose to stimulate interest and add enjoyment to play.

Another object is to make available a game of sufficient similarity to chess as to make the playing of or the desire to play the game greater than with the general run-of-the-mill type game.

Another object is to obtain a really new game which is not a mere poor-substitute for some other game, but which on its own has approaches of attack and of defense and of purpose of play distinctly different from heretofore-known games.

Other objects become apparent from the preceding and following disclosure.

One or more objects of the present invention are obtained by the invention as defined herein.

Broadly the invention includes the employment of a particular parlor-type playing board the size of which is optional and similarly rather than there being a printed board there may be upwardly extending walls and/or barriers such as with a real or simulatedstructure fortress and/or castle or the like, with paths and/or co rridor(s) of movement or the like in substitution for and/or in combination with a printed surface, and there are provided preferably two sets of playing pieces, but there may optionally be additional set(s) of third and/or fourth forces of friend(s) or foe(s) for defense and/or attack-on the castle area. In a typical and preferred embodiment, there are provided on the board playing circles on which only one-at-a-time pieces may be situated as in chess and checkers, with routes of move being indicated from circle to circle, and between different ones of the consecutive circles there being one or more moving spaces, there being preferably for each set a single king, four knights, and eight pawns, a king being able to capture an opponent king, knights, and pawns, while a knight may capture only opponent knights and pawns, and a pawn may capture only opponent pawns. A king moves solely from circle to circle in a preferred embodiment, and jumps solely one circle to a third occurring serially consecutive circle if" the intermediate second-occurring jumped circle is occupied by an opponent king, but not being permitted to jump that second-occurring circle if it is occupied by a knight or pawn which not only are safe from attack (capture) by the king when on the cir' cle, but block movement of and/or jumping by the king along that course of direction. On the other hand, knights are not safe on circles from capture by an opponent knight, and pawns are not safe on circles from capture by opponent knights or opponent pawns. Each of the knights and each of the pawns may move solely one digit of move per turn, such as from a space to a space or from a space to a circle or from a circle to a space, and may jump only one next occurring digit position, such as a next space or circle if the next space or circle is occupied by a piece which is capturable thereby as a knight capturing either a knight or pawn or as a pawn capturing a pawn of an opponent, but not being ableto capture if the subsequent second space is occupied by either a friendly or opponent piece, two opponent pieces properly positioned always serving when consecutively located to prevent move or jump therealong. Accordingly, a king may move from one circle to the next consecutive circle if the next circle is not occupied and may jump the next consecutive circle if occupied by opponent king unless there is occupied also the next second circle in series along the particular route ofjump and/or unless between either or both the beginning circle of move and the first circle nextoccurring or between the first circle and the second circle next-occurring there occur two consecutively adjacent pieces, whether friend or foe but normally two adjacent foe pieces one backing-up the other to block movement and jumping by the opponent pieces unless more than one alternate direction exists and/or unless when between spaces in a king-jump. Also, accordingly a knight may move from one position to the next-occurring position unless occupied by a friend or foe, and may jump a next occurring foe if otherwise jumpable by that piece if the next-occurring piece is not backed-up by another piece, and similarly for a pawn being able to move and jump.

Within the inner-castle or inner-fortress moving circles and spaces, particular ones are identified as gameentry points, the pieces entering the game one-at-atime preferably; and similarly the outside-of-castle or outside-of-fortress moving circles or spaces include game-entry points, one or more.

The entry of a piece serves as a complete turn for a player, in a preferred game.

Although never more than one move may be made per turn of play, in a preferred game, nevertheless there may be consecutive jumps by a single piece if such ad- 3 ditional jump(s) would qualify as the initial jump; otherwise, only a single jump may be made.

As indicated on the accompanying illustrated playing board, there are many optional possibilities of move and/or jump per turn per piece on the board, unless blocked by an opponent.

With the above board and pieces in mind, the objectofa preferred game may be well understood namely,

that once both players (or each set in the game) have at least one piece on or within the castle or fortress walls, it is the object of each player to so move as to capture by jumping(s) all opponents piece(s) within the castle or fortress and/or to chase-out the last of opponent piece(s) from within the castle or fortress, the player whose piece(s) are within the wall (devoid of other player(s) pieces) being the winner. Obviously, if in preferred rules where one-at-a-time one piece enters per player turn, the game may end long before all pieces of either player have entered the game.

Obviously, however, different variations on the purpose and object of the game are possible utilizing the same basic method of play and board, and similarly the board of play need not take any specific form, it being equally possible for there to be a dividing line with one side thereof for one set and the other side for the other set initially, but otherwise the game of play being the same, and also possibly the game starting with one or more pieces already on the board. However, the game as described in the above-noted preferred embodiment offers particular challenge and variation on old-hat approaches.

The game may be better understood by reference to the following Figures.

THE FIGURES FIG. 1 illustrates a perspective side view of a typical and preferred playing board for the above-described game.

FIG. 2 illustrates two sets of black and white opposing game pieces of a preferred embodiment, shown in elevation side view.

FIG. 3 illustrates in elevation side view and diagrammatically the capture-capability of each of different pieces of each set, illustrating for solely the black set in this illustration, capture of opponent white pieces being by jumping over those pieces.

FIG. 4 illustrates an in-part perspective view of the board of FIG. 1 and illustrates capability of various pieces to move and jump from point to point.

FIG. 5, analogous to the FIG. 4 view, further illustrates a typical game situation, further illustrating capability of various pieces to move and/or jump.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION In greater detail, FIGS. 1, 4 and 5 illustrate a preferred board of play and typical piece moves of various pieces thereon and of getting onto the board initially.

In particular, in FIG. 1 there is the board 7 of the overall game and printing thereon, jointly referred to as 6, with safe spaces in the outer ring such as safe spaces 8a and 8b, and non-safe spaces such as space 9, Spaces such as 8a and 8b are safe for knights 13 and 13' and pawns 14 and 14' against capture by kings such as 12 and 12, but not safe from other knights such as 13 and 13, and the pawns l4 and 14 are not safe from c'apture by other pawns as shown in FIGS. 2 through 5. Space 8a having a dark dot 80 therein is indicative of being a space onto which as a full move any black piece may initially enter the game by being placed onto the board during the game turn of play for black. Between these above-noted playing spaces are connecting lines which are indicative of the direction(s) that any of the pieces may move, double (or paired) lines being representative of the walls of the fortress or castle, it being in a preferred embodiment of the method of play a purpose for one set of pieces to chase-out and/or take the total number of pieces (actively in play) of the opponent, chasing the opponent pieces from within and- /or on the outer circumscribing walls 10. Along the inner walls, available to typically any white piece, are safe-game-entering spaces having dark dot 8c therein.

FIG. 2 illustrates the pieces noted above as black attacking pieces 11 and defending pieces 11, including for each set preferably one black king 12, four black knights 13, and eight black pawns 14, with the defense white set 11 having the same numbers of each respectively, for the white king 12, the white knights 13', and the white pawns 14'. In FIG. 3, there is diagrammatically represented the fact that a king may jump and thereby capture any one or more of an opponent king, knight, and pawn on the same or different movefSimilarly, there is illustrated the fact that a knight may not capture a king, but may capture other knights and pawns of the opponent, and that a pawn may not capture opposing kings or knights but may capture opponent pawns.

FIG. 4 illustrates typically how black king 12 has entered (S) the game at an outer safe-space (gameentering space) as one move, and thereafter on a next move for black 12 moved a single space, and on the next move another single space, and on the next turn moved by jumping to its next (second) space 8a thereby jumping over and taking white knight l3 and then in the same move continuing (as a serial jump) .to jump to a next (fourth) space 8a jumping over and thereby also capturing white pawn 14' (on the third space 8a); thereafter the king 12 moves one space, and on the next-turn-move thereafter jumps in a single multiple-jump move over a knight (located between two spaced 8b and also over the adjacent king on a nextoccurring space 8b (since a kingjumps a king by jumping over a space which in an ordinary non-jumping move would be the space to which black would move) to the thereafter next-occurring space 812 following the jumped king, black king 12 therefore also jumping the pawn located between the jumped king 12' and the next-occurring space 8b beyond the king 12' whereby in this last jump (of the multiple jump) there were captured a knight, a king, and a pawn of the white set. Moves intermediate the black moves have been omitted to avoid confusion, the above description being only indicative of move and of capture capabilities.

In FIG. 5, there is illustrated the initial move of a white knight 13 entering (S) the game as a total single turn-move by entering the game on a game-entering spot of an inner safe-space; on the move thereafter, the white knight jumped a black pawn; on a subsequent turn-move the white knight moved one space to a block (non-safe) next occurring; and on the next subsequent move the knight in a serial-jump jumped a pawn and (in the same turn) a black knight.

Also in FIG. 5, white pawn 14 enters (S) at an inner entry safe space (at a dot) as one move, and on subsequent two turns-of-move advances to the right of the Figure to a standard safe space and on the next turn make a serial jump over consecutive black pawns.

As noted heretofore, a black piece may not jump its own other black piece and may not move-around its own other black piece. Nor may a black piece move around another piece that it cannot jump (capture). A piece may not enter on a space already occupied, in a preferred embodiment of the play of the game. Also, a black king, for example, may not jump over another king on a next-occurring space 8a or 8b (for example) if the thereafter subsequent space 8a or 8b is occupied already. Similarly, a black knight may not jump a next occurring white pawn and white knight located thereafter if there is no space between the white pawn and the white knight onto which the black knight may first land behind the white pawn and immediately in-front-of and adjacent the white knight, i.e., there must be a space between the white pawn and the white knight for the black knight to be able to jump the white pawn the adjacently located white pawn and white knight therefore effectively blocking the black knight from jumping the pawn and/or the knight.

it is within the spirit and scope of the present game combination to make such variations and modifications as would be apparent to a person skilled in this art.

I claim:

1. A game device comprising in combination: a playing board having a playing pattern substantially as shown in FIG. 1 of the drawing, and at least two separately identifiable sets of playing-pieces, each set comprising a king-designated and identifiable king-player piece, knight-player pieces, and pawn-player pieces. 

1. A game device comprising in combination: a playing board having a playing pattern substantially as shown in FIG. 1 of the drawing, and at least two separately identifiable sets of playing-pieces, each set comprising a king-designated and identifiable king-player piece, knight-player pieces, and pawnplayer pieces. 